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Call for Papers

13th CINet Conference 2012
Continuous Innovation Across Boundaries
Rome, Italy, 16-18 September 2012

Deadline for extended abstract or full paper: March 15, 2012


Conference Track on "MNCs, innovation and international knowledge sourcing"

This track addresses how multinational corporations (MNCs) leverage external sources of knowledge to innovate.

Foreign subsidiaries are increasingly recognized as crucial players for the development of new competencies and as sources of strategic value for the creation of MNC competitive advantage. Subsidiary's local embeddedness (Andersson, Forsgren, & Holm, 2002), assimilation capabilities (Phene & Almeida, 2008), location (Frost, Birkinshaw, & Ensign, 2002; Pearce & Singh, 1992), age (Rabbiosi & Santangelo, 2012) and initiative (Birkinshaw, 1997; Birkinshaw, Hood, & Jonsson, 1998) have been found to influence subsidiary knowledge creation. Moreover, it is recognized that foreign subsidiaries are part of both an internal and external network and that knowledge ownership increases subsidiaries' power within the MNC (Andersson, Forsgren, & Holm, 2007; Bouquet & Birkinshaw, 2008). Academic research on the process of the globalization of MNC innovation and the role played by foreign subsidiaries has grown dramatically in the last decade. These studies offer an excellent starting point and highlight some interesting opportunities for further research.

Such opportunities, for instance, could lie in addressing the following issues: (i) how MNCs design governance mechanisms and manage the headquarters-subsidiary relationships to influence the way in which subsidiaries tap into local knowledge and their innovative activities and, therefore, the competitive advantage of the MNC as a whole; (ii) how subsidiary ability to source locally can be influenced by the type of subsidiary (e.g., strategic mandate; entry mode) and the socio-economic environment in which the subsidiary operates; (iii) given that headquarters may lack the knowledge and understanding of their subsidiaries' activities and networks, how goals incongruence and information asymmetry problems can affect potential benefits of subsidiary innovation and knowledge creation.

Accordingly, this track wants to explore further these issues and shed more light on how foreign subsidiaries' processes for creating, transferring and assimilating knowledge can influence MNC innovation and be influenced by the decisions of the headquarters and other MNC units. We would like to call for contributions that cover one or more of the following questions. These are suggestive, rather than exhaustive:



-          What governance mechanisms are more suitable for facilitating subsidiary knowledge sourcing?

-          How can MNCs design their internal structures and networks to benefit from their external networks (e.g., with suppliers, customers, universities, governmental entities)? Are lessons learned from one type of network useful for organizing the other type of network?

-          What is the role of the headquarters in relation to the subsidiary sourcing activities? What are the effects of new ways of organizing headquarter activities on the efficiency and effectiveness of the subsidiaries' ability to tap into local knowledge?

-          Are the kind of linkages and networks developed by foreign subsidiaries contingent on their strategic role (e.g., adaptor; competence-creating; implementer; strategic leader; center of excellence), the purpose of the interaction (e.g. exploration of new knowledge versus exploitation of existing knowledge), other characteristics of the subsidiary (e.g., entry mode, age, location, resource availability), the institutional setting (e.g. the IPR regime, labor law, political stability, level of corruption) and the local environmental conditions (e.g. supply of skilled individuals)?

-          How can MNCs benefit from subsidiaries' knowledge sourcing and at the same time prevent or limit knowledge spillovers locally?

Keywords: MNCs and global and local innovation; local embeddedness and subsidiary innovation; learning across borders; Intra-firm and inter-firm networks; MNC strategic organization of search

Paper submission: Researchers wishing to contribute are invited to submit an extended abstract or a full paper through the conference website (http://www.continuous-innovation.net/Events/CINet2012.html) no later than March 15, 2012.

Extended abstracts (in Word format) of 1000-1500 words should address theoretical background, research objective, methodology, and results in terms of expected contribution and must follow the submission guidelines
Full papers (in Word format) should not exceed 6.000 words (all included) and must be in accordance with the formatting guidelines.

Submissions received will undergo a double blind peer review, and the outcome of the review process will be sent to the authors by April 27, 2012. The submission (abstract or paper) can be accepted, provisionally accepted or rejected.



For accepted abstracts and papers a final version of the full paper is due on June 1, 2012. The review committee will go through these submissions and authors can be asked to do minor improvements of the paper. Resubmissions of final papers (where minor changes were advised) are due on July 1, 2012.


Registration: At least one author needs to register together with the submission of the final paper otherwise the paper will not be included in the proceedings nor mentioned in the programme. Registration for the conference can be done on the conference website http://www.continuous-innovation.net/Events/CINet2012.html before July 1, 2012.



Important dates

Extended abstract/full paper submission: 15th March, 2012

Notice for paper acceptance: 27th April, 2012

Final paper submission: 1st June, 2012

Conference registration: 1st July, 2012

For more information, please refer to the track chair: Larissa Rabbiosi, Copenhagen Business School ([log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>).



References
Andersson, U., Forsgren, M., & Holm, U. (2002). The strategic impact of external networks: subsidiary performance and competence development in the multinational corporation. Strategic Management Journal, 23, 979-996.
Andersson, U., Forsgren, M., & Holm, U. (2007). Balancing subsidiary influence in the federative MNC: A business network view. Journal of International Business Studies, 38, 802-818.
Birkinshaw, J. (1997). Entrepreneurship in multinational corporations: The characteristics of subsidiary initiatives. Strategic Management Journal, 18, 207-229.
Birkinshaw, J., Hood, N., & Jonsson, S. (1998). Building firm-specific advantages in multinational corporations: the role of subsidiary initiative. Strategic Management Journal, 19, 221-241.
Bouquet, C., & Birkinshaw, J. (2008). Weight versus voice: how foreign subsidiaries gain attention from corporate headquarters. Academy of Management Journal, 51, 577-601.
Frost, T. S., Birkinshaw, J. M., & Ensign, P. C. (2002). Centers of excellence in multinational corporations. Strategic Management Journal, 23, 997-1018.
Pearce, R. D., & Singh, S. (1992). Globalizing Research and Development. New York: St. Martin's Press.
Phene, A., & Almeida, P. (2008). Innovation in multinational subsidiaries: the role of knowledge assimilation and subsidiary capabilities Journal of International Business Studies, 39, 901-919.
Rabbiosi, L., & Santangelo, G. D. (2012). Parent company's benefits from reverse knowledge transfer: The role of the liability of newness in MNEs. Journal of World Business, Forthcoming.





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